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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/28665018">something like Eurydice</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/marymags/pseuds/marymags'>marymags</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Doctor Who (2005)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Episode AU: s02e04 The Girl in the Fireplace</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-01-10</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-01-10</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-13 04:33:32</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Not Rated</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Major Character Death</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>2</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>888</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/28665018</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/marymags/pseuds/marymags</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>another, 'the ship is empty' stories</p><p>cw: blood mentions</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>8</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. Chapter 1</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    
<p></p><div>
  <p>Her face comes through the static. He's watched this so many times.</p>
  <p>Her eyes are dry, but she's betrayed by a flush.   There is an overall tenseness most apparent in her forehead and lips which age her; no one could confuse this woman for a child.</p>
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  <p>
    <em>" if you were coming back I'd- I'd give you a smack, but considering this is the last I speak to you.." </em>
  </p>
</div><div>
  <p> She turns her head over her shoulder with a big reflexive smile-- the one thats typically reserved for the most cruel of idiots they come across in their travels. To see it on her face for him... she shakes her head and sniffs before turning back to the camera with that soft sadness that fierce empathy he knows.</p>
</div><div>
  <p><em>"I didn't imagine it might end like this" </em>she nods to herself</p>
</div><div>
  <p>
    <em>"-- but Doctor, you gave me the stars. It's all been so, so fantastic,"</em>
  </p>
</div><div>
  <p>She smiled, a real one, but he has a sick feeling that its not for him, not really, not <em>this </em>him,</p>
</div><div>
  <p>
    <em>"and you, you deserve to be happy. I hope - I- I <b>really</b> hope you're happy" </em>
  </p>
</div><div>
  <p>It's said with such desperate earnestness, but even she hears how classically sarcastic the wording is and grimaces, face down, shaking her head, as though staving off other things she wants to say, before turning  the recording off. </p>
</div><div>
  <p> </p>
</div><div>
  <p>The ship is empty. Well, not entirely. But Rose isn't there.  He knows, he's scoured every corner. He's found many broken and loose gears of the shattered remains of the droids, human organs disintegrated into thick dust, blood stains blackened with time. Mickey too, he's here-- his body at least.  The Doctor may deserve this, but Mickey was a kid cusping on adulthood and Rose, Rose- </p>
</div><div>
  <p>He thinks now that this is what he never sticks around for. The eerie silence, heavy musk, following the time of action and excitement. It's like bathing in death; he did enough of that on Gallifrey.  He wasn't here for this one though.  He chose a different adventure to play hero in. The ghosts of violence linger; hairs stand on his arms and neck. He keeps looking over his shoulder like she might be there, to make sure she's not there. An echo of a girl, his own crushing guilt. A loss whose magnitude he doesn't care to accept, because she's warm and breathing somewhere as long as he doesn't find her-- not.    A continual disappointment and relief to find her missing. Some blood is hers, some tissue, not enough for a body, not enough to indicate fatality. She was here, she bled here, she was scared. The air still holds human fear pheromones. </p>
</div>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. Chapter 2</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p> </p><p>On the surface perhaps it appeared as though the Doctor returned to his life as a nomadic rogue. There was no joy. He was once a man single minded in his own destruction, and once again he was headed only in one direction.  He just didn’t know what direction that was exactly.  On more hopeful days he insisted it was towards her living body.  But there were half-clues at best to start from. Truly, it was impossible that she should be missing like this. He checked London, Powell Estate. He couldn’t explain it yet, couldn’t face Jackie —not yet, not when he knew nothing. So, he multiplied his crimes and surveyed  Rose’s mother. He Screened her calls, monitored her visitors, her daily routines. He found only the same open wound of someone <em>missing </em>in her life too.  Jackie would die young, at 49 years old. She would never see her daughter again, and he  never felt more like the villain.</p><p>He scanned for her constantly, catching on yellow and pink. Before, he had scoffed at the Time Agency, the nuisance of it, never imaging the decades he would spend processing records and tracking vortex manipulators. Nothing. Absolutely nothing.<em> Are any stolen? Are any missing? Are any faulty?</em></p><p>Her absence was a void with weight, and he orbited the vacuum she left. Time was measured in Rose-colored units, the rotation of her planet around itself, around it's star.  How many London mornings since he last saw her? How many solstices since her birth? There was only Before and After.</p><p>Running, rather, colliding into Jack brought a fraction of the punishment he deserved, with some relief he didn’t.</p><p>“I have to ask—Rose, she, on Earth-- there’s no record of her after age 20.”</p><p>Jack was heartsick and hopeful, his wet, shining eyes waiting for some explanation. It was too soon for the Doctor. Nearly a century had passed since he left the spaceship and he was no closer to any answers. His superior biology didn’t protect him from some emotional reactions. He looked away, lips twisted, hearts pounding in his throat.</p><p>“  what  happened ?   ”</p><p>Jack was breathy with disbelief. What <em>did</em> happen? The Doctor didn’t even know. She was still out there somewhere, she had to be. No one can just disappear. Her death hadn’t happened yet, not if he didn’t see evidence of it.  He had not been confronted with an inevitability he couldn't rationalize. Rose never sees her mother again? Unfortunate, but fine. She had him.  Rose never returns to Earth at all? Well, without Jackie why bother? So many planets to explore--with him. She should always be with him. </p><p>“I … lost her”</p>
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